Does Agile Test Management Still Need a Test Manager?
People keep asking me whether an agile project still needs a test manager. My answer: it depends on which tasks the team needs from that role and on who in the team can take them on. In agile test management, the tasks remain; what’s open is who owns them.
Every professional project has quality assurance work, whether it runs on a traditional or an agile model. In a traditional setup, the test manager covers much of it, with a focus on test planning and test control. In an agile team, everyone is responsible for quality. The work is still there, but it no longer has to sit with one person who carries the title.
What the ISTQB Syllabi Say About the Test Management Role
The ISTQB glossary defines the test manager as the person responsible for managing test activities, test resources, and evaluating the test object. The Foundation Level 4.0 syllabus also describes a test management role. It focuses on test planning, test monitoring, test control, and test completion, and a team leader, a test manager, or a development manager can fill it.
For agile software development, the syllabus gets specific. The agile team may handle some of the test management tasks itself. Tasks that span multiple teams or the entire organization may sit with test managers outside the development team. The Advanced Level Test Management 3.0 syllabus goes one step further: in iterative models such as Scrum, roles are integrated, and a facilitator or coach replaces the traditional test manager.
Test Manager Roles and Responsibilities in Agile Teams
So what does the work look like? In a traditional project, the test manager would have handled the following tasks. An agile team still needs every one of them.
Release and Iteration Planning
- Estimate test effort and feasibility, for example with Planning Poker
- Group content that belongs together, and can therefore be tested efficiently, into one or a few releases or iterations
- Make sure test effort is part of the estimate for each backlog item
Product Backlog and Acceptance Criteria
- Review backlog items for clarity, consistency, completeness, and above all testability
- Read each item from the customer’s and the end user’s point of view
- Check that acceptance criteria exist and are clear, free of contradictions, and verifiable (and, where it matters for testing, testable)
Test Strategy, Environments, and Automation
- Create a test strategy that fits the chosen development approach
- Set up continuous integration with testing built in and connect every test level, from unit tests for test-driven development to system and acceptance tests
- Make test results visible in reports and dashboards, and define the path from test to pre-production
- Organize the test environment, test rooms, and equipment
- Pick tools through proofs of concept, decide how tests are managed, and work out an approach to automation at the system and acceptance test level
- Push automation of unit, integration, and acceptance tests, and make sure a usable test automation framework is in place
Team Setup and Collaboration
- Make sure experienced testers and test management know-how are on board, and grow the team’s testing skills where needed
- Agree on how development and testing work together: are there separate developer and tester tasks, or does testing simply follow development?
- Make it visible when development is done and testing can start
- Decide whether testers use the team’s task board or a separate one
- Settle how defects are reported, on the task board or in a tool
Definition of Done
- Work out the Definition of Done together, with a focus on quality, testability, and measurability
- Check that given constraints, such as legal regulations, are covered in the DoD
We describe what this can look like in detail in our book “Agile Testing: The Agile Way to Quality.”
How Does Test Management Work in Agile Projects?
In agile software development, other roles already cover many of these tasks. Scrum, for example, has only a Product Owner, a Scrum Master, and Developers in the Scrum Team, with no sub-teams and no hierarchy. The Developers build quality in by meeting the Definition of Done. If the organization doesn’t set one, the Scrum Team creates its own.
For everything else, the team decides whether someone takes it on, and who. Sometimes the tasks pile up with one person. That’s fine as long as it doesn’t turn into a knowledge silo. In my experience, it works better to share the tasks across several team members and keep an eye on the activities together.
Documentation moves along with the tasks. Much of what used to go into a test plan now lives in acceptance criteria and the Definition of Done. The Advanced Level syllabus recommends documenting the test strategy but doesn’t require a formal test plan for it. For agile projects, it mentions agreeing on an iteration test plan as an option.
Is the Test Manager Out of a Job?
All these tasks are now spread across the team. Does that make the test manager obsolete? Quite the opposite. Their knowledge and experience are still worth a lot.
When a company moves to agile development, though, test managers face a fair question: where do I go from here? Over the past years, I have coached many test managers who stood at exactly that point. Some joined agile projects as testers and drove the testing work there. Others became Agile Quality Coaches. They built a new understanding of their role and now support projects across the company. There they help developers and other team members
- fit quality tasks into their daily work,
- think through questions about testing and quality with a sparring partner,
- make quality an attitude the whole team shares,
- get infrastructure, test data, and test strategy in place.
From Gantt Charts to Team Facilitator
The need for well-targeted software tests keeps growing as systems interact more and get more complex. That makes a test manager’s knowledge more valuable. What do efficient tests look like? Which tests come first?
The classic image of the role has had its day: the manager waving a test plan hundreds of pages long and brooding over Gantt charts all day. You meet that person less and less. The agile test manager is a team facilitator who brings their know-how into development and test teams and helps them find their own path to quality.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does an agile test manager do?
An agile test manager supports the team instead of running testing alone. They bring testing know-how into release and iteration planning, backlog reviews, and the Definition of Done, push for verifiable acceptance criteria, and help with test strategy, environments, and automation. Other team members share many of these tasks, so no knowledge silo forms.
What is the difference between a test lead and a test manager in agile teams?
ISTQB separates the two. Its glossary describes the test leader as the person who reports to the test manager on large projects and manages a particular test level or set of test activities. The Foundation syllabus lets a team leader, a test manager, or a development manager fill the test management role, and agile teams take on part of it.
Where do project test managers fit in an agile organization?
Above the individual team. According to the ISTQB Foundation syllabus, tasks that span multiple teams or the entire organization may sit with test managers outside the development team. Some test managers also move into coaching: as Agile Quality Coaches, they help teams fit quality tasks into daily work and set up test data and test strategy.
